Do You Hate Your Old Epoxy Floor Coating?

Minnesota Epoxy Floor Coating Installation

Nobody ever fully knows their own house. Unless it’s been yours from the beginning, there are always going to be a few secrets to uncover. Maybe you’ll find the second hatch to your attic one day. The pipes don’t flow from the main supply line like you thought they would. Soon you’re going to want to replace the wallpaper, and you might find a flashback to the house’s first decade underneath the surface.

Floors are the exact same way. You’ll peel back the carpet to find fake wood laminate squares underneath the foam layers. That floating wood floor hides the previous owner’s experiment with acid-stained concrete. No matter what the history is, that old flooring is getting in the way of your next innovation. But if you pull back the layers to find an epoxy floor coating when you wanted an epoxy floor coating in the first place, you can’t just add a new coat on top. There’s a lot of prep work to do first.

Even if you like the old coloring, it might not be salvageable. You have to check for delaminating, peeling, and signs of damage. Old epoxy floors, especially if they were self-installed, weren’t built to last. It was probably covered up for a reason. Once you know it’s time to get that old flooring out of the way. Call in a professional. Here are reasons to hire an expert instead of just covering up the floor:

1. Epoxy flooring experts can grind down the damaged coats.

Unless the stars align, you can’t just apply new epoxy over the previous flooring. It has to be a compatible chemical, can’t have underlying damage, and can only take dark or clear coatings. An expert can let you know if the prior material is the right fit for a quick new coat.

But if the flooring can’t be saved, you need a professional to grind down the surface. The entire coat has to be removed so there isn’t any lingering unevenness or scraps of color. If the old material isn’t compatible with polyurea floor coatings, it has to be completely removed in order to make sure there’s a strong bond between your concrete and the coats.

Grinding down the floor is also the first step for installing a polyurea floor coating. It removes the latent layer of concrete, or the weak layer that moisture passed through during the curing process. If the previous floor was a DIY project, the old owner probably didn’t complete that step.

2. Experienced installers can troubleshoot your floors to get to the underlying cause of prior damage.

Old floor coats didn’t just go bad because of age or because they’re a bad fit for your renovation. Experienced floor installers can examine patchy areas for underlying causes of damage. Maybe there’s an expanding crack. Or maybe the water supply line passes under that point so there’s a lot of moisture in that portion of the concrete.

If you’re working in the garage, there could also be old chemical spills and tire damage. Hire technicians who can get to the bottom of the damage so it doesn’t happen twice.

3. They can prep your floor for a long-lasting floor coating and seal.

Grinding down the concrete is just one of the steps for preparing your base concrete. It’s important to repair the concrete, level dipped patches, and completely clean the surface (both of particles and chemicals). Whether you want to apply your own floor coating or you want an expertly applied floor that will last, the preparation of the floor is important.

Of course, your floor will last longer if you hire experts to apply stronger polyurea coats that aren’t available in big box stores. Go to PolyTek Surface Coatings here to pick the services you want or to talk to someone about getting your floor handled from start to finish.